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Remember when last year’s Year of the Rooster event brought back Capture the Flag as a memorable game mode for players of all skill levels to enjoy? This also introduced the new map Ayutthaya for players to experience. It was a big hit, and it paved the way for Capture the Flag’s competitive season.

To nobody’s surprise, Lúcio has been a popular support pick in this particular game mode. It’s almost impossible to see a Capture the Flag match without someone choosing this versatile hero to accompany their team to victory.

But what may come as a surprise is the fatal news that Lúcio is getting a big nerf – and soon. When this year’s Year of the Dog event springs into action, which should be happening this week, Lúcio may suddenly drop in popularity when it comes to choice hero selection.

A Bad Time for Movement Abilities

Blizzard has explained – and explicitly shown us – that any hero with movement abilities will instantly drop the flag as soon as they enable those movements. But the ever-elusive Lúcio has been able to evade this annoying circumstance. So far, his movement abilities have not impacted his flag-dropping skills. Players love to use Wall Ride to quickly escape with the flag, bringing his team to victory every time. Most people are lead to believe that this is why Lúcio is such a popular pick in Capture the Flag: If his movement abilities aren’t affected like everyone else’s, doesn’t that make him broken?

Alas, Blizzard has finally taken notice of this. Whether or not they have deemed this as an official “exploit”, they are bringing the patch hammer down hard on Lúcio. As the Year of the Dog patch is well underway, players can expect to see a nerf to Lúcio’s movement abilities during Capture the Flag events.

While unfortunate, it does make sense: Lúcio has been able to get to unreachable places and escape with the flag far too fast. It puts all other heroes to shame. With the new changes in this week’s patch, there will at least be a more balanced opportunity for heroes in Capture the Flag mode.

Also, for those of you having a tough time in the competitive mode for Capture the Flag, you might want to take a look at what Boostards and Boosting Hero have to offer. They generally offer Overwatch Boosting services, but have been known to also sell boosting for timed events like Lucioball and Uprising!

Confirmed and Updated

It’s true; Jeff Kaplan himself announced that changes to Lúcio would be coming very soon. As of the newest patch, Lúcio will now drop the flag if he uses Wall Ride.

Kaplan says, “Not only is his speed unreasonably fast with the boost from Wall Ride, but he can also get to places that are very difficult to defend against.”

If you’re playing Overwatch on the PC, you are likely already seeing this change in Lúcio’s abilities with Capture the Flag. If you are a console player, the patch should come in sometime later this week.

Have you noticed any other changes or nerfs to heroes with this newest patch? What kind of changes are you looking forward to the most? Let us know your thoughts!

Overwatch’s now customary annual event has finally arrived! For this Lunar New Year, it’s the Year of the Dog, and the game is celebrating with some new additions and loot options that you’ll certainly be wagging your tail for.

The long-awaited New Year’s event has returned with a bucketload of new skins, emotes, loot box items, and much more.

So, here’s what’s in store for the Year of the Dog event this weekend. In this guide, you’ll find everything you need to know!

When is the Lunar New Year event?

The Year of the Dog Overwatch event takes place from February 16th until March 5th, giving you three weeks of magical Lunar New Year celebrations.

Why does it start later than it did last year?

For those of you who participated in the Year of the Rooster event in 2017, you may remember it starting at the tail end of January. Blizzard has done a good job keeping in line with the actual Chinese New Year, which starts much later this year. That’s why this year’s release date for the event isn’t until February 16th.

What New Features Have Been Added?

In spirit of the Lunar New Year and the cultures that celebrate it, a new Thailand map has been added for the event. But that’s not the only exciting addition to the game – there are also six new Legendary skins for some of your favorite heroes!

You have to check out Road Hog’s sea-faring new skin, as well as Mercy’s Chinese-inspired New Year holiday garb. They are al skins worth working hard for!

Competitive CTF?

As most of you should also know by now, there’s a competitive mode for CTF with its own ranking ladder! Just like Lucioball in the previous event. The same goes for this time, and as we know that many players won’t have enough time to juggle between regular competitive and CTF competitive, there are many options and services available out there that might be able to help with getting that elusive CTF rank boost for your ego 😉

Two options we’re aware of are Boostards and Boosting Hero. These sites have been featured on our blog before for their usual services, but as far as we know, they also provide event-related services and very well might support something for CTF as well!

How Can You Get the New Skins?

Just like last year’s event, you can acquire the new skins through loot boxes, which are only available during the Lunar New Year event. This is why it’s super important to play as much as you can during the event, because once the Year of the Dog has ended, you won’t be able to acquire the skins!

And if you weren’t able to get your favorite New Years’ skins from last year, don’t fret! They’ll be returning for purchase to the in-game store. Based on past events, the previous Lunar New Year skins should be purchasable for about 3,000 Overwatch coins. Most of the time, Blizzard sponsors a discount during the event to make it easier to get ahold of the ones you missed.

What Else is Coming to Overwatch?

While this isn’t paired with the Year of the Dog, the PvE Uprising mode will be returning soon too! While there aren’t too many details on it yet, players can absolutely look forward to the return of the popular PvE mode. As the Year of the Dog launches, there may be more updates and information regarding obtainable items and features. It’s always best to keep an eye out!

After a popular debut during 2016’s Summer Olympics, the 2017 Overwatch Summer Games have returned for another fun summer. Represent your favorite hero’s country with exciting new skins, themes, arenas, and leaderboards. Visit new parts of the world that all of your favorite characters can take pride in! From August 8th to August 28th, you will be able to feel the spirit of competition by participating in limited-time events, with 10 action-packed days full of new skins and exciting loot crate opportunities. From Lucioball to over 50 new items, the Overwatch Summer Games are here in full force! Jump in this season for the opportunity to get some original event loot!

Overwatch Summer Games Skins

There are a lot of new features, additions, and play styles available in this year’s Summer Games. 2016 sported new skins, some of which have returned this year for a second chance to acquire them. If you missed out on McCree’s “American” skin or Genji’s “Nihon” skin from last year, now’s your chance to fight for victory and claim your customization prizes. The same goes for emotes and victory poses as well.

Of course, this year is not without its wide variety of new skins as well. Some exciting new customization textures have been added to the most popular characters of Overwatch, making players even more excited to get their hands on those loot crates. Check out Grillmaster: 76, Mercy’s Winged Victory, or even the grumpy Lifeguard McCree to pair perfectly with the heroes whose summer skins you earned last year.

And if you don’t feel like testing your RNG luck by buying loot boxes, you can purchase the previous year’s Legendary skins with credits too. They are even sold at a discount!

And speaking of loot boxes…

Overwatch Summer Games Loot Boxes

There are over 10 new cosmetic items available for 10 days only this year. By taking part in the Overwatch Summer Games, you have the unique chance of acquiring loot boxes like never before. All of the popular victory poses, emotes, and voice lines from last year have a chance to show up in a loot box as well, but you’ll really want to get your hands on one so that you can see some of the best items fresh from Blizzard’s Overwatch team. We know it’s a lot of work to grind for these boxes, so if you rather get someone else to do this for you, you can consider getting an overwatch boost from these guys.

Emotes, Highlight Intros, and Victory Poses

All of the popular emotes and cosmetic choices from 2016’s Overwatch Summer Games have returned, and you have a chance to score them through loot boxes. There are a lot of new emotes, highlight intros, and victory poses as well that players are dying to get their hands on. Pharah’s Slam Dunk and Hanzo’s Target Practice highlight intros are bound to be popular picks, while Ana’s Beach Ball emote is an exciting new choice that players can’t wait to experience live.

The New Arena

This year’s Overwatch Summer Games has an exciting arena opportunity for players to get invested in. It’s easy to spend hours in this fun tournament mode! You may remember Lucioball from last year’s exciting Olympic-inspired games – well, it has returned for another exciting season of intense play! But now, there are several new changes and featured added to make Lucioball even more fun.

You may be familiar with the futuristic location of Rio de Janiero that Lucioball was placed in last year. You still have a chance to play on that beautiful 3v3 field, but now you have a chance to land in a new arena as well – the Sydney Harbour Arena!

Plus, there are now two Lucioball game modes: Lucioball, and Copa Lucioball, which introduces an all-new rating tier, competitive placement matches, and its very own leaderboard. You are free to play either of these two gaming styles as much as you want, but for 10 days only!

Play the Overwatch Summer Games Today!

There are only 2 weeks to experience everything the exciting Summer Games have to offer. For a limited time, you can gain experience with new leaderboards, a competitive arena, an exciting ranking system, and of course, over 150 new cosmetic options that will come as part of the loot box system. The more you play, the better chance you have to get your hands on some limited-time loot. It’s hard to pass up this deal! By participating in the Overwatch Summer Games, you will be able to acquire a piece of something that may not ever return to Overwatch again. Make your mark in Overwatch history by jumping into the Overwatch Summer Games today! Hurry, because you only have until August 28th!

Since taking top honors at the 2016 Game Awards, Overwatch, the team based, multiplayer, First-Person Shooter (Whew, Quite a mouthful!) has steadily increased its loyal following of gamers by doling out a near constant stream of updates and new characters to take control of and create havoc in the game world. It’s popularity has birthed a whole crew of new service providers including Overwatch boosting, which has taken over the Overwatch competitive playerbase. The latest update from Blizzard has teased the possible identity of Overwatch’s upcoming new playable character, number 24 if anyone is keeping count out there.

In a blog post from Blizzard’s official website, we are introduced to 11 year old Efi Oladele. Hailing from Numbani, Efi is the prestigious recipient of the “Adawe Foundation’s Genius Grant.” From the in-universe interview, we learn that she has a deep interest in all things mechanical and chats about her achievements in robotics and Artificial Intelligence. She has a clear plan on what she wants to do with the Grant, but purposefully doesn’t reveal it in the interview, only stating that her parents are taking her on a trip to celebrate, which will also see her flying for the first time.

From the brief interview, she comes across as humble and slightly overwhelmed with the attention she’s receiving from winning the Grant, but determined to advance her knowledge of robotics and AI. Sporting a snazzy gold crown, some headphones with earrings attached and what looks to be a necklace with an electrical cord connected to it, Efi certainly looks the part of a child robotics expert.

Although gamers were still disappointed with the news of Doomfist’s character reveal being delayed, the blog was met with enthusiasm from the Overwatch community. Also, it has led to debate whether Efi will actually be the 24th playable character, or if she’s simply being used to flesh out the backstory of the real upcoming playable character. Many gamers have suggested this on the basis that it seems quite unlikely that Blizzard would have you controlling an eleven year old child in battle. If we examine Blizzard’s track record of character reveals, each one was preceded by a similar blog post, which lends credence to Efi being a playable character.

Other users have suggested that an older version of Efi will be used instead, but that rumour was shot down in a twitter post from lead writer Michael Chu, stating that the interview takes place in the present day and there will be no time skips or flash forwards. This definitively rules out the possibility of seeing an older Efi laying waste in the game world.

Another interesting theory that has been doing the rounds concerns Efi’s genius ability with AI, some believe she will use the grant money to build a robot, as she states she wants to build something to keep the world safe just like the OR15’s. In this case, the robot that Efi builds will be the playable character instead.

While speculation is rampant and theories are flying around the internet faster than a speeding bullet, one thing is certain, Blizzard always has a knack for surprising their fans, and when the 24th playable character is finally revealed, it will no doubt be a cause for celebration.

The highly entertaining, yet really really challenging competitive mode in the game Overwatch is one of the most fast-paced, difficult and sometimes infuriating games on the market today. Without a good team, it is really difficult to make any advancements in your ranking, which also means it’s a pain for you to climb to the next rank or obtain any CP (competitive points) for the season. Initially, players must play ten qualifying matches and are ranked based on both their standalone proficiency in addition to the ratio of wins to losses. Only after this initial phase is completed are players given a ranking number, at which point they can then play in the competitive mode.

Keep in mind, this number is adjusted as the player continues to play competitive. As you win or lose throughout the season, your rank can change, moving up or down, depending on matches won and your personal performance demonstrated in matches. This can be a very arduous and challenging task. It can make even the best of us want to throw our controllers or keyboards across the room!

This is why a new service, known as Overwatch Competitive Boosting now exists. Basically, players find and pay a web-based company to help “boost” their performance and ranking. Players are charged a certain amount of money, which is dependent upon how many ranks up they want to achieve. What follows is a very interesting take on a new and possibly very insecure idea. An employee of the boosting company who is highly proficient in the game logs into your account and plays matches for you, effectively ranking you up without you having to lift a finger. Sounds like a great idea right?

There are a number of websites that offer this Overwatch boosting service, making for an increasingly competitive business niche. With just a simple Google search, you can find numerous companies who offer this service, which can be carried out across platforms. It’s not only for PC players anymore; now even Xbox One and PlayStation 4 users can carry themselves out of elo hell with this helpful service as well. At www.boostards.com, it costs a user about $80 to go from Gold to Platinum, which means that a random person logs into your account and plays for you.

There are also sites that offer other services, like “professional coaching”, you can choose from a number of professional players who will find out what you are looking for in your gameplay and help coach you through the game, giving you helpful tips and ways to play that will rank you up in no time. You can choose coaches for either individual or team play. This option is a much more secure one, as you will not have to give anyone your personal information in order to get assistance. It is also a much more expensive option, with hourly rates beginning at $15/hour and capping at about $40/hour.

Why do this? Well, it’s hard to say. Many argue that the lure for the end of season rewards, and CP (competitive points) which you can use to purchase cosmetic items in-game to be a good enough reason to use this unique service. Others think it’s a waste of money. We just think it’s an interesting topic to cover.

When you find a video game that manages to pull in more than seven million players in its first two weeks of existence, you can be sure that it is the kind that will spark your interest. Blizzard has always been a developer that has exceeded your expectations and the unveiling of Overwatch was not an exception. This lightning fast game will ensure that your free time is always put to good use. If you want to polish your playing skills, are a beginner, or simply want to know what the game has to offer, these Overwatch tips will come in handy!

Fight for overtime

In case you run out of time when trying to capture a point, ensure that you are close enough so that the game can automatically go into overtime. One team member should always remain near the objective in order for the game to continue and to also give you more time for the chance of making a comeback victory!

Make the most of the character swapping

Character swapping may just be one of the best things about Overwatch. If changing a character may benefit you and lead your team to a win then do not hesitate to do this. A single switch may be enough to turn around your performance. Look out for counterpicks and find out which enemy hero is giving your team the most trouble.

Always have a support

Although supports are overlooked, they are quite powerful. Consider characters like Lucio for frontline support and Zenyatta for healing support. Support heroes have extremely powerful ultimates that can make or break any team fight, and provide healing and sustenance for your team. They are absolutely essential if you want to have a good shot at winning.

One role cannot rule them all (LotR reference!)

Overwatch does not come with one perfect role. A team could either be strong or weak depending on a particular challenge. As such, it is important to assess your team and establish the roles that it could be lacking. This will ensure that your team composition is balanced and gives you a fighting chance against the enemy team if they also have a balanced team composition.

Be an aggressive tank

If you are playing a tank then do not be afraid to jump into the fight and establish your presence. Tanks need to cause chaos and confuse the enemies. Your job is to pose a threat for the enemy team, draw their fire, and basically take damage for your team while letting your team counter attack.

Defend and attack

Defense characters should not only be subjected to defending. They can also play offense. For instance, Widowmaker and Mei are heroes that work well on both attack and defense. Don’t let the role of a hero fool you into thinking that you can only play them a certain way.

Ensure that supports are protected

Do not let your supports get attacked, for they are classified as the weakest characters. As already discussed, supports are valuable characters and as such, letting them die would mean your team loses its form of sustain and without heals, it can be hard to win a drawn out team battle.

Overwatch may be a game that comes with a lot of great learning curves, however, with the right enthusiasm, you will learn how to play it in the shortest possible time. With these tips, you can never go wrong! If you are confused about what heroes you should pick, here’s an Overwatch tier list from Boostards that might be helpful when making your pick decisions.